Voice-based media searching

ABSTRACT

Methods and systems for searching for media items using a voice-based digital assistant are described. Natural language text strings corresponding to search queries are provided. The search queries include query terms. The text strings may correspond to speech inputs input by a user into an electronic device. At least one information source is searched to identify at least one parameter associated with at least one of the query terms. The parameters include at least one of a time parameter, a date parameter, or a geo-code parameter. The parameters are compared to tags of media items to identify matches. In some implementations, media items whose tags match the parameter are presented to the user.

RELATED APPLICATION

This application claims priority to U.S. Provisional Application Ser. No. 61/703,176, filed Sep. 19, 2012, which is incorporated herein by reference in its entirety.

TECHNICAL FIELD

The disclosed implementations relate generally to digital assistant systems, and more specifically, to a method and system for voice-based media searching.

BACKGROUND

Advances in camera technology, image pressing and image storage technology have enabled humans to seamlessly interact with and “capture” their surroundings through digital photography. Moreover, recent advances in technology surrounding hand-held devices (e.g., mobile phones and digital assistant systems) have improved image capture and image storage capabilities on hand-held devices. This has led to a substantial increase in the use of hand-held devices for photo acquisition and digital photo storage.

The growing volume of digital photographs acquired and stored on electronic devices has created a need for systematic cataloging and efficient organization of the photographs in order to enable ease of viewing and searching. Tagging of photographs, for example, by associating with the photograph names of people or places, facilitates the ease of organizing and searching for photographs. Other information, such as time, date, and GPS coordinate data, are also increasingly associated with photographs, allowing efficient sorting and organization.

while photo capture and digital image storage technology has improved substantially over the past decade, traditional approaches to photo searching can be non-intuitive, arduous, and time-consuming.

SUMMARY

Accordingly, there is a need for a simple, intuitive, user-friendly way to search for photographs. The present invention provides systems and methods for voice-based photo searching implemented at an electronic device.

Implementations described below provide a method and system of voice-based photo searching through the use of natural language processing techniques. Natural language processing techniques are deployed to enable users to interact in spoken or textual forms with hand-held devices and digital assistant systems, whereby digital assistant systems can interpret the user's input to deduce the user's intent, translate the deduced intent into actionable tasks and parameters, execute operations or deploy services to perform the tasks, and produce output that is intelligible to the user.

Voice-based photo searching dramatically increases the speed and convenience of photo searching. For example, by combining speech recognition techniques with intelligent natural-language processing, the disclosed implementations enable users simply to speak a description of the photographs that they want to search for, such as “show me my vacation photos,” and the photos will be automatically identified and returned to the user for viewing, editing, and the like. The disclosed techniques are able to process this speech-based input in order to find and retrieve relevant photographs even where the photographs have not been previously associated with user-generated textual tags, such as “vacation” or “beach.” Rather, metadata that is stored with digital photographs when they are captured or saved is cross-referenced with other user information to facilitate searching. For example, a calendar entry indicating that a user's vacation spans a certain set of days can be used to create a search query to find photographs taken or saved on those dates. As another example, a table associating geo-codes with locations may be consulted to determine a range of geo-codes that corresponds to a location identified in a search query. The user's photographs can then be searched to find those whose geo-codes correspond to the identified location.

Thus, the implementations disclosed herein provide methods, systems, and computer readable storage media that enable voice-based, natural-language photo searching.

Some implementations provide a method for searching for media items using a voice-based digital assistant. The method is performed at an electronic device with a processor and memory storing instructions for execution by the processor. The method includes providing multiple media items. Media items may include photographs, videos, and/or audio. At least some of the media items are each associated with a respective tag comprising at least one of a time tag, a date tag, or a geo-code tag. In some implementations, tags are stored with media items as metadata.

The method further includes providing a natural language text string corresponding to a search query for one or more media items, where the search query includes one or more query terms. In some implementations, the text string corresponds to a speech input from a user. In some implementations, the speech input is converted to text using speech-to-text processing.

The method further includes searching at least one information source to identify at least one parameter associated with at least one of the one or more query terms. In some implementations, the information source is a calendar, email/text messages, social network postings, a contact book, and/or the like. The at least one parameter comprises at least one of a time parameter, a date parameter, or a geo-code parameter. The at least one parameter is separate from the tags associated with the multiple media items, e.g., the parameter is not part of a media item's metadata.

The method further includes comparing the respective tags to the at least one parameter to identify at least one media item whose tag matches the identified parameter, and facilitating the presentation of the at least one media item to a user. In some implementations, facilitating the presentation includes displaying the at least one media item to the user.

In accordance with some embodiments, an electronic device including one or more processors, memory, and one or more programs stored in the memory and configured to be executed by the one or more processors include instructions for performing the operations of any of the methods described above. In accordance with some embodiments, a non-transitory computer readable storage medium has stored therein instructions which, when executed by an electronic device, cause the device to perform the operations of any of the methods described above

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

FIG. 1 is a block diagram illustrating an environment in which a digital assistant operates in accordance with some implementations.

FIG. 2 is a block diagram illustrating a digital assistant client system in accordance with some implementations.

FIG. 3A is a block diagram illustrating a standalone digital assistant system or a digital assistant server system in accordance with some implementations.

FIG. 3B is a block diagram illustrating functions of the digital assistant shown in FIG. 3A in accordance with some implementations.

FIG. 3C is a network diagram illustrating a portion of an ontology in accordance with some implementations.

FIGS. 4A-4C are flow charts illustrating a method for searching for media items using a voice-based digital assistant, in accordance with some implementations.

Like reference numerals refer to corresponding parts throughout the drawings.

DESCRIPTION OF IMPLEMENTATIONS

FIG. 1 is a block diagram of an operating environment 100 of a digital assistant according to some implementations. The terms “digital assistant,” “virtual assistant, ” “intelligent automated assistant,” or “automatic digital assistant,” refer to any information processing system that interprets natural language input in spoken and/or textual form to deduce user intent (e.g., identify a task type that corresponds to the natural language input), and performs actions based on the deduced user intent (e.g., perform a task corresponding to the identified task type). For example, to act on a deduced user intent, the system can perform one or more of the following: identifying a task flow with steps and parameters designed to accomplish the deduced user intent (e.g., identifying a task type), inputting specific requirements from the deduced user intent into the task flow, executing the task flow by invoking programs, methods, services, APIs, or the like (e.g., sending a request to a service provider); and generating output responses to the user in an audible (e.g., speech) and/or visual form.

Specifically, a digital assistant system is capable of accepting a user request at least partially in the form of a natural language command, request, statement, narrative, and/or inquiry. Typically, the user request seeks either an informational answer or performance of a task by the digital assistant system. A satisfactory response to the user request is generally either provision of the requested informational answer, performance of the requested task, or a combination of the two. For example, a user may ask the digital assistant system a question, such as “Where am I right now?” Based on the user's current location, the digital assistant may answer, “You are in Central Park near the west gate.” The user may also request the performance of a task, for example, by stating “Please invite my friends to my girlfriend's birthday party next week.” In response, the digital assistant may acknowledge the request by generating a voice output, “Yes, right away,” and then send a suitable calendar invite from the user's email address to each of the user' friends listed in the user's electronic address book or contact list. There are numerous other ways of interacting with a digital assistant to request information or performance of various tasks. In addition to providing verbal responses and taking programmed actions, the digital assistant can also provide responses in other visual or audio forms (e.g., as text, alerts, music, videos, animations, etc.).

As shown in FIG. 1, in some implementations, a digital assistant system is implemented according to a client-server model. The digital assistant system includes a client-side portion (e.g., 102 a and 102 b) (hereafter “digital assistant (DA) client 102”) executed on a user device (e.g., 104 a and 104 b), and a server-side portion 106 (hereafter “digital assistant (DA) server 106”) executed on a server system 108. The DA client 102 communicates with the DA server 106 through one or more networks 110. The DA client 102 provides client-side functionalities such as user-facing input and output processing and communications with the DA server 106. The DA server 106 provides server-side functionalities for any number of DA clients 102 each residing on a respective user device 104 (also called a client device).

In some implementations, the DA server 106 includes a client-facing I/O interface 112, one or more processing modules 114, data and models 116, an I/O interface to external services 118, a photo and tag database 130, and a photo-tag module 132. The client-facing I/O interface facilitates the client-facing input and output processing for the digital assistant server 106. The one or more processing modules 114 utilize the data and models 116 to determine the user's intent based on natural language input and perform task execution based on the deduced user intent. Photo and tag database 130 stores fingerprints of digital photographs, and, optionally digital photographs themselves, as well as metadata and user- and/or automatically-generated tags associated with the digital photographs. Photo-tag module 132 creates tags, stores tags in association with photographs and/or fingerprints, automatically tags photographs, and links tags to locations within photographs.

In some implementations, the DA server 106 communicates with external services 120 (e.g., navigation service(s) 122-1, messaging service(s) 122-2, information service(s) 122-3, calendar service 122-4, telephony service 122-5, photo service(s) 122-6, social networking service(s) 122-7, etc.) through the network(s) 110 for task completion or information acquisition. The I/O interface to the external services 118 facilitates such communications.

Examples of the user device 104 include, but are not limited to, a handheld computer, a personal digital assistant (PDA), a tablet computer, a laptop computer, a desktop computer, a cellular telephone, a smartphone, an enhanced general packet radio service (EGPRS) mobile phone, a media player, a navigation device, a game console, a television, a remote control, or a combination of any two or more of these data processing devices or any other suitable data processing devices. More details on the user device 104 are provided in reference to an exemplary user device 104 shown in FIG. 2.

Examples of the communication network(s) 110 include local area networks (“LAN”) and wide area networks (“WAN”), e.g., the Internet. The communication network(s) 110 may be implemented using any known network protocol, including various wired or wireless protocols, such as Ethernet, Universal Serial Bus (USB), FIREWIRE, Global System for Mobile Communications (GSM), Enhanced Data GSM Environment (EDGE), code division multiple access (CDMA), time division multiple access (TDMA), Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP), Wi-MAX, or any other suitable communication protocol.

The server system 108 can be implemented on at least one data processing apparatus and/or a distributed network of computers. In some implementations, the server system 108 also employs various virtual devices and/or services of third party service providers (e.g., third-party cloud service providers) to provide the underlying computing resources and/or infrastructure resources of the server system 108.

Although the digital assistant system shown in FIG. 1 includes both a client-side portion (e.g., the DA client 102) and a server-side portion (e.g., the DA server 106), in some implementations, a digital assistant system refers only to the server-side portion (e.g., the DA server 106). In some implementations, the functions of a digital assistant can be implemented as a standalone application installed on a user device. In addition, the divisions of functionalities between the client and server portions of the digital assistant can vary in different implementations. For example, in some implementations, the DA client 102 is a thin-client that provides only user-facing input and output processing functions, and delegates all other functionalities of the digital assistant to the DA server 106. In some other implementations, the DA client 102 is configured to perform or assist one or more functions of the DA server 106.

FIG. 2 is a block diagram of a user device 104 in accordance with some implementations. The user device 104 includes a memory interface 202, one or more processors 204, and a peripherals interface 206. The various components in the user device 104 are coupled by one or more communication buses or signal lines. The user device 104 includes various sensors, subsystems, and peripheral devices that are coupled to the peripherals interface 206. The sensors, subsystems, and peripheral devices gather information and/or facilitate various functionalities of the user device 104.

For example, in some implementations, a motion sensor 210 (e.g., an accelerometer), a light sensor 212, a GPS receiver 213, a temperature sensor, and a proximity sensor 214 are coupled to the peripherals interface 206 to facilitate orientation, light, and proximity sensing functions. In some implementations, other sensors 216, such as a biometric sensor, barometer, and the like, are connected to the peripherals interface 206, to facilitate related functionalities.

In some implementations, the user device 104 includes a camera subsystem 220 coupled to the peripherals interface 206. In some implementations, an optical sensor 222 of the camera subsystem 220 facilitates camera functions, such as taking photographs and recording video clips. In some implementations, photographs and video clips are associated with metadata when they are taken by the camera subsystem 220. Metadata includes, for example, a date tag, a time tag, and a location tag (e.g., a geo-code tag). These tags identify, respectively, the date, time, and location of the photo or video. These tags can be used for search and categorization functionality by the user device 104 (and/or the digital assistant system as a whole), as described below.

In some implementations, the user device 104 includes one or more wired and/or wireless communication subsystems 224 provide communication functions. The communication subsystems 224 typically includes various communication ports, radio frequency receivers and transmitters, and/or optical (e.g., infrared) receivers and transmitters. In some implementations, the user device 104 includes an audio subsystem 226 coupled to one or more speakers 228 and one or more microphones 230 to facilitate voice-enabled functions, such as voice recognition, voice replication, digital recording, and telephony functions.

In some implementations, an I/O subsystem 240 is also coupled to the peripheral interface 206. In some implementations, the user device 104 includes a touch screen 246, and the I/O subsystem 240 includes a touch screen controller 242 coupled to the touch screen 246. When the user device 104 includes the touch screen 246 and the touch screen controller 242, the touch screen 246 and the touch screen controller 242 are typically configured to, for example, detect contact and movement or break thereof using any of a plurality of touch sensitivity technologies, such as capacitive, resistive, infrared, surface acoustic wave technologies, proximity sensor arrays, and the like. In some implementations, the user device 104 includes a display that does not include a touch-sensitive surface. In some implementations, the user device 104 includes a separate touch-sensitive surface. In some implementations, the user device 104 includes other input controller(s) 244. When the user device 104 includes the other input controller(s) 244, the other input controller(s) 244 are typically coupled to other input/control devices 248, such as one or more buttons, rocker switches, thumb-wheel, infrared port, USB port, and/or a pointer device such as a stylus.

The memory interface 202 is coupled to memory 250. In some implementations, memory 250 includes a non-transitory computer readable medium, such as high-speed random access memory and/or non-volatile memory (e.g., one or more magnetic disk storage devices, one or more flash memory devices, one or more optical storage devices, and/or other non-volatile solid-state memory devices).

In some implementations, memory 250 stores an operating system 252, a communications module 254, a graphical user interface module 256, a sensor processing module 258, a phone module 260, and applications 262, and a subset or superset thereof. The operating system 252 includes instructions for handling basic system services and for performing hardware dependent tasks. The communications module 254 facilitates communicating with one or more additional devices, one or more computers and/or one or more servers. The graphical user interface module 256 facilitates graphic user interface processing. The sensor processing module 258 facilitates sensor-related processing and functions (e.g., processing voice input received with the one or more microphones 228). The phone module 260 facilitates phone-related processes and functions. The application module 262 facilitates various functionalities of user applications, such as electronic-messaging, web browsing, media processing, navigation, imaging and/or other processes and functions. In some implementations, the user device 104 stores in memory 250 one or more software applications 270-1 and 270-2 each associated with at least one of the external service providers.

As described above, in some implementations, memory 250 also stores client-side digital assistant instructions (e.g., in a digital distant client module 264) and various user data 266 (e.g., user-specific vocabulary data, preference data, and/or other data such as the user's electronic address book or contact list, to-do lists, shopping lists, etc.) to provide the client-side functionalities of the digital assistant.

In various implementations, the digital assistant client module 264 is capable of accepting voice input, text input, touch input, and/or gestural input through various user interfaces (e.g., the I/O subsystem 244) of the user device 104. The digital assistant client module 264 is also capable of providing output in audio, visual, and/or tactile forms. For example, output can be provided as voice, sound, alerts, test messages, menus, graphics, videos, animations, vibrations, and/or combinations of two or more of the above. During operation, the digital assistant client module 264 communicates with the digital assistant server (e.g., the digital assistant server 106, FIG. 1) using the communication subsystems 224.

In some implementations, the digital assistant client module 264 utilizes various sensors, subsystems and peripheral devices to gather additional information from the surrounding environment of the user device 104 to establish a context associated with a user input. In some implementations, the digital assistant client module 264 provides the context information or a subset thereof with the user input to the digital assistant server (e.g., the digital assistant server 106, FIG. 1) to help deduce the user's intent.

In some implementations, the context information that can accompany the user input includes sensor information, e.g., lighting, ambient noise, ambient temperature, images or videos of the surrounding environment, etc. In some implementations, the context information also includes the physical state of the device, e.g., device orientation, device location, device temperature, power level, speed, acceleration, motion patterns, cellular signals strength, etc. In some implementations, information related to the software state of the user device 106, e.g., running processes, installed programs, past and present network activities, background services, error logs, resources usage, etc., of the user device 104 is also provided to the digital assistant server (e.g., the digital assistant server 106, FIG. 1) as context information associated with a user input.

In some implementations, the DA client module 264 selectively provides information (e.g., at least a portion of the user data 266) stored on the user device 104 in response to requests from the digital assistant server. In some implementations, the digital assistant client module 264 also elicits additional input from the user via a natural language dialogue or other user interfaces upon request by the digital assistant server 106 (FIG. 1). The digital assistant client module 264 passes the additional input to the digital assistant server 106 to help the digital assistant server 106 in intent deduction and/or fulfillment of the user's intent expressed in the user request.

In some implementations, memory 250 may include additional instructions or fewer instructions. Furthermore, various functions of the user device 104 may be implemented in hardware and/or in firmware, including in one or more signal processing and/or application specific integrated circuits, and the user device 104, thus, need not include all modules and applications illustrated in FIG. 2.

FIG. 3A is a block diagram of an exemplary digital assistant system 300 (also referred to as the digital assistant) in accordance with some implementations. In some implementations, the digital assistant system 300 is implemented on a standalone computer system. In some implementations, the digital assistant system 300 is distributed across multiple computers. In some implementations, some of the modules and functions of the digital assistant are divided into a server portion and a client portion, where the client portion resides on a user device (e.g., the user device 104) and communicates with the server portion (e.g., the server system 108) through one or more networks, e.g., as shown in FIG. 1. In some implementations, the digital assistant system 300 is an embodiment of the server system 108 (and/or the digital assistant server 106) shown in FIG. 1. In some implementations, the digital assistant system 300 is implemented in a user device (e.g., the user device 104, FIG. 1), thereby eliminating the need for a client-server system. It should be noted that the digital assistant system 300 is only one example of a digital assistant system, and that the digital assistant system 300 may have more or fewer components than shown, may combine two or more components, or may have a different configuration or arrangement of the components. The various components shown in FIG. 3A may be implemented in hardware, software, firmware, including one or more signal processing and/or application specific integrated circuits, or a combination of thereof.

The digital assistant system 300 includes memory 302, one or more processors 304, an input/output (I/O) interface 306, and a network communications interface 308. These components communicate with one another over one or more communication buses or signal lines 310.

In some implementations, memory 302 includes a non-transitory computer readable medium, such as high-speed random access memory and/or a non-volatile computer readable storage medium (e.g., one or more magnetic disk storage devices, one or more flash memory devices, one or more optical storage devices, and/or other non-volatile solid-state memory devices).

The I/O interface 306 couples input/output devices 316 of the digital assistant system 300, such as displays, a keyboards, touch screens, and microphones, to the user interface module 322. The I/O interface 306, in conjunction with the user interface module 322, receives user inputs (e.g., voice input, keyboard inputs, touch inputs, etc.) and process them accordingly. In some implementations, when the digital assistant is implemented on a standalone user device, the digital assistant system 300 includes any of the components and I/O and communication interfaces described with respect to the user device 104 in FIG. 2 (e.g., one or more microphones 230). In some implementations, the digital assistant system 300 represents the server portion of a digital assistant implementation, and interacts with the user through a client-side portion residing on a user device (e.g., the user device 104 shown in FIG. 2).

In some implementations, the network communications interface 308 includes wired communication port(s) 312 and/or wireless transmission and reception circuitry 314. The wired communication port(s) receive and send communication signals via one or more wired interfaces, e.g., Ethernet, Universal Serial Bus (USB), FIREWIRE, etc. The wireless circuitry 314 typically receives and sends RF signals and/or optical signals from/to communications networks and other communications devices. The wireless communications may use any of a plurality of communications standards, protocols and technologies, such as GSM, EDGE, CDMA, TDMA, Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, VoIP, Wi-MAX, or any other suitable communication protocol. The network communications interface 308 enables communication between the digital assistant system 300 with networks, such as the Internet, an intranet and/or a wireless network, such as a cellular telephone network, a wireless local area network (LAN) and/or a metropolitan area network (MAN), and other devices.

In some implementations, the non-transitory computer readable storage medium of memory 302 stores programs, modules, instructions, and data structures including all or a subset of: an operating system 318, a communications module 320, a user interface module 322, one or more applications 324, and a digital assistant module 326. The one or more processors 304 execute these programs, modules, and instructions, and reads/writes from/to the data structures.

The operating system 318 (e.g., Darwin, RTXC, LINUX, UNIX, OS X, iOS, WINDOWS, or an embedded operating system such as VxWorks) includes various software components and/or drivers for controlling and managing general system tasks (e.g., memory management, storage device control, power management, etc.) and facilitates communications between various hardware, firmware, and software components.

The communications module 320 facilitates communications between the digital assistant system 300 with other devices over the network communications interface 308. For example, the communication module 320 may communicate with the communications module 254 of the device 104 shown in FIG. 2. The communications module 320 also includes various software components for handling data received by the wireless circuitry 314 and/or wired communications port 312.

In some implementations, the user interface module 322 receives commands and/or inputs from a user via the I/O interface 306 (e.g., from a keyboard, touch screen, and/or microphone), and provides user interface objects on a display.

The applications 324 include programs and/or modules that are configured to be executed by the one or more processors 304. For example, if the digital assistant system is implemented on a standalone user device, the applications 324 may include user applications, such as games, a calendar application, a navigation application or an email application. If the digital assistant system 300 is implemented on a server farm, the applications 324 may include resource management applications, diagnostic applications, or scheduling applications, for example.

Memory 302 also stores the digital assistant module (or the server portion of a digital assistant) 326. In some implementations, the digital assistant module 326 includes the following sub-modules, or a subset or superset thereof: an input/output processing module 328, a speech-to-text (STT) processing module 330, a natural language processing module 332, a dialogue flow processing module 334, a task flow processing module 336, a service processing module 338, and a photo module 132. Each of these processing modules has access to one or more of the following data and models of the digital assistant 326, or a subset or superset thereof: ontology 360, vocabulary index 344, user data 348, categorization module 349, disambiguation module 350, task flow models 354, service models 356, search module 360, and local tag/photo storage 362.

In some implementations, using the processing modules (e.g., the input/output processing module 328, the STT processing module 330, the natural language processing module 332, the dialogue flow processing module 334, the task flow processing module 336, and/or the service processing module 338), data, and models implemented in the digital assistant module 326, the digital assistant system 300 performs at least some of the following: identifying a user's intent expressed in a natural language input received from the user; actively eliciting and obtaining information needed to fully deduce the user's intent (e.g., by disambiguating words, names, intentions, etc.); determining the task flow for fulfilling the deduced intent; and executing the task flow to fulfill the deduced intent. In some implementations, the digital assistant also takes appropriate actions when a satisfactory response was not or could not be provided to the user for various reasons.

In some implementations, as discussed below, the digital assistant system 300 identities, from a natural language input, a user's intent to search for photographs. The digital assistant system 300 processes the natural language input so as to determine what photographs may be relevant to the user's search query. In some implementations, the digital assistant system 300 performs other tasks related to photographs as well, such as tagging digital photographs, as described, for example, in “Voice-Based Image Tagging and Searching,” Attorney docket number 063266-5572-US, which is incorporated by reference herein in its entirety.

As shown in FIG. 3B, in some implementations, the I/O processing module 328 interacts with the user through the I/O devices 316 in FIG. 3A or with a user device (e.g., a user device 104 in FIG. 1) through the network communications interface 308 in FIG. 3A to obtain user input (e.g., a speech input) and to provide responses to the user input. The I/O processing module 328 optionally obtains context information associated with the user input from the user device, along with or shortly after the receipt of the user input. The context information includes user-specific data, vocabulary, and/or preferences relevant to the user input. In some implementations, the context information also includes software and hardware states of the device (e.g., the user device 104 in FIG. 1) at the time the user request is received, and/or information related to the surrounding environment of the user at the time that the user request was received. In some implementations, the I/O processing module 328 also sends follow-up questions to, and receives answers from, the user regarding the user request. In some implementations, when a user request is received by the I/O processing module 328 and the user request contains a speech input, the I/O processing module 328 forwards the speech input to the speech-to-text (STT) processing module 330 for speech-to-text conversions.

In some implementations, the speech-to-text processing module 330 receives speech input (e.g., a user utterance captured in a voice recording) through the I/O processing module 328. In some implementations, the speech-to-text processing module 330 uses various acoustic and language models to recognize the speech input as a sequence of phonemes, and ultimately, a sequence of words or tokens written in one or more languages. The speech-to-text processing module 330 is implemented using any suitable speech recognition techniques, acoustic models, and language models, such as Hidden Markov Models, Dynamic Time Warping (DTW)-based speech recognition, and other statistical and/or analytical techniques. In some implementations, the speech-to-text processing can be performed at least partially by a third party service or on the user's device. Once the speech-to-text processing module 330 obtains the result of the speech-to-text processing (e.g., a sequence of words or tokens), it passes the result to the natural language processing module 332 for intent deduction.

The natural language processing module 332 (“natural language processor”) of the digital assistant 326 takes the sequence of words or tokens (“token sequence”) generated by the speech-to-text processing module 330, and attempts to associate the token sequence with one or more “actionable intents” recognized by the digital assistant. As used herein, an “actionable intent” represents a task that can be performed by the digital assistant 326 and/or the digital assistant system 300 (FIG. 3A), and has an associated task flow implemented in the task flow models 354. The associated task flow is a series of programmed actions and steps that the digital assistant system 300 takes in order to perform the task. The scope of a digital assistant system's capabilities is dependent on the number and variety of task flows that have been implemented and stored in the task flow models 354, or in other words, on the number and variety of “actionable intents” that the digital assistant system 300 recognizes. The effectiveness of the digital assistant system 300, however, is also dependent on the digital assistant system's ability to deduce the correct “actionable intent(s)” from the user request expressed in natural language.

In some implementations, in addition to the sequence of words or tokens obtained from the speech-to-text processing module 330, the natural language processor 332 also receives context information associated with the user request (e.g., from the I/O processing module 328). The natural language processor 332 optionally uses the context information to clarify, supplement, and/or further define the information contained in the token sequence received from the speech-to-text processing module 330. The context information includes, for example, user preferences, hardware and/or software states of the user device, sensor information collected before, during, or shortly after the user request, prior interactions (e.g., dialogue) between the digital assistant and the user, and the like.

In some implementations, the natural language processing is based on an ontology 360. The ontology 360 is a hierarchical structure containing a plurality of nodes, each node representing either an “actionable intent” or a “property” relevant to one or more of the “actionable intents” or other “properties.” As noted above, an “actionable intent” represents a task that the digital assistant system 300 is capable of performing (e.g., a task that is “actionable” or can be acted on). A “property” represents a parameter associated with an actionable intent or a sub-aspect of another property. A linkage between an actionable intent node and a property node in the ontology 360 defines how a parameter represented by the property node pertains to the task represented by the actionable intent node.

In some implementations, the ontology 360 is made up of actionable intent nodes and property nodes. Within the ontology 360, each actionable intent node is linked to one or more property nodes either directly or through one or more intermediate property nodes. Similarly, each property node is linked to one or more actionable intent nodes either directly or through one or more intermediate property nodes. For example, the ontology 360 shown in FIG. 3C includes a “restaurant reservation” node, which is an actionable intent node. Property nodes “restaurant,” “date/time” (for the reservation), and “party size” are each directly linked to the “restaurant reservation” node (i.e., the actionable intent node). In addition, property nodes “cuisine,” “price range,” “phone number,” and “location” are sub-nodes of the property node “restaurant,” and are each linked to the “restaurant reservation” node (i.e., the actionable intent node) through the intermediate property node “restaurant.” For another example, the ontology 360 shown in FIG. 3C also includes a “set reminder” node, which is another actionable intent node. Property nodes “date/time” (for the setting the reminder) and “subject” (for the reminder) are each linked to the “set reminder” node. Since the property “date/time” is relevant to both the task of making a restaurant reservation and the task of setting a reminder, the property node “date/time” is linked to both the “restaurant reservation” node and the “set reminder” node in the ontology 360.

An actionable intent node, alone with its linked concept nodes, may be described as a “domain.” In the present discussion, each domain is associated with a respective actionable intent, and refers to the group of nodes (and the relationships therebetween) associated with the particular actionable intent. For example, the ontology 360 shown in FIG. 3C includes an example of a restaurant reservation domain 362 and an example of a reminder domain 364 within the ontology 360. The restaurant reservation domain includes the actionable intent node “restaurant reservation,” property nodes “restaurant,” “date/time,” and “party size,” and sub-property nodes “cuisine,” “price range,” “phone number,” and “location.” The reminder domain 364 includes the actionable intent node “set reminder,” and property nodes, “subject” and “date/time.” In some implementations, the ontology 360 is made up of many domains. Each domain may share one or more property nodes with one or more other domains. For example, the “date/time” property node may be associated with many other domains (e.g., a scheduling domain, a travel reservation domain, a movie ticket domain, etc.), in addition to the restaurant reservation domain 362 and the reminder domain 364.

While FIG. 3C illustrates two exemplary domains within the ontology 360, the ontology 360 may include other domains (or actionable intents), such as “initiate a phone call,” “find directions,” “schedule a meeting,” “send a message,” and “provide an answer to a question,” “tag a photo,” and so on. For example, a “send a message” domain is associated with a “send a message” actionable intent node, and may further include property nodes such as “recipient(s),” “message type,” and “message body.” The property node “recipient” may be further defined, for example, by the sub-property nodes such as “recipient name” and “message address.”

In some implementations, the ontology 360 includes all the domains (and hence actionable intents) that the digital assistant is capable of understanding and acting upon. In some implementations, the ontology 360 may be modified, such as by adding or removing domains or nodes, or by modifying relationships between the nodes within the ontology 360.

In some implementations, nodes associated with multiple related actionable intents may be clustered under a “super domain” in the ontology 360. For example, a “travel” super-domain may include a cluster of property nodes and actionable intent nodes related to travels. The actionable intent nodes related to travels may include “airline reservation,” “hotel reservation,” “car rental,” “get directions,” “find points of interest,” and so on. The actionable intent nodes under the same super domain (e.g., the “travels” super domain) may have many property nodes in common. For example, the actionable intent nodes for “airline reservation,” “hotel reservation,” “car rental,” “get directions,” “find points of interest” may share one or more of the property nodes “start location,” “destination,” “departure date/time,” “arrival date/time,” and “party size.”

In some implementations, each node in the ontology 360 is associated with a set of words and/or phrases that are relevant to the property or actionable intent represented by the node. The respective set of words and/or phrases, associated with each node is the so-called “vocabulary” associated with the node. The respective set of words and/or phrases associated with each node can be stored in the vocabulary index 344 (FIG. 3B) in association with the property or actionable intent represented by the node. For example, returning to FIG. 3B, the vocabulary associated with the node for the property of “restaurant” may include words such as “food,” “drinks,” “cuisine,” “hungry,” “eat,” “pizza,” “fast food,” “meal,” and so on. For another example, the vocabulary associated with the node for the actionable intent of “initiate a phone call” may include words and phrases such as “call,” “phone,” “dial,” “ring,” “call this number,” “make a call to,” and so on. The vocabulary index 344 optionally includes words and phrases in different languages.

In some implementations, the natural language processor 332 shown in FIG. 3B receives the token sequence (e.g., a test string) from the speech-to-text processing module 330, and determines what nodes are implicated by the words in the token sequence. In some implementations, if a word or phrase in the token sequence is found to be associated with one or more nodes in the ontology 360 (via the vocabulary index 344), the word or phrase will “trigger” or “activate” those nodes. When multiple nodes are “triggered,” based on the quantity and/or relative importance of the activated nodes, the natural language processor 332 will select one of the actionable intents as the task (or task type) that the user intended the digital assistant to perform. In some implementations, the domain that has the most “triggered” nodes is selected. In some implementations, the domain having the highest confidence value (e.g., based on the relative importance of its various triggered nodes) is selected. In some implementations, the domain is selected based on a combination of the number and the importance of the triggered nodes. In some implementations, additional factors are considered in selecting the node as well, such as whether the digital assistant system 300 has previously correctly interpreted a similar request from a user.

In some implementations, the digital assistant system 300 also stores names of specific entities in the vocabulary index 344, so that when one of these names is detected in the user request, the natural language processor 332 will be able to recognize that the name refers to a specific instance of a property or sub-property in the ontology. In some implementations, the names of specific entities are names of businesses, restaurants, people, movies, and the like. In some implementations, the digital assistant system 300 can search and identify specific entity names from other data sources, such as the user's address book or contact list, a movies database, a musicians database, and/or a restaurant database. In some implementations, when the natural language processor 332 identifies that a word in the token sequence is a name of a specific entity (such as a name in the user's address book or contact list), that word is given additional significance in selecting the actionable intent within the ontology for the user request.

For example, when the words “Mr. Santo” are recognized from the user request, and the last name “Santo” is found in the vocabulary index 344 as one of the contacts in the user's contact list, then it is likely that the user request corresponds to a “send a message” or “initiate a phone call” domain. For another example, when the words “ABC Café” are found in the user request, and the term “ABC Café” is found in the vocabulary index 344 as the name of a particular restaurant in the user's city, then it is likely that the user request corresponds to a “restaurant reservation” domain.

User data 348 includes user-specific information, such as user-specific vocabulary, user preferences, user address, user's default and secondary languages, user's contact list, and other short-term or long-term information for each user. The natural language processor 332 can use the user-specific information to supplement the information contained in the user input to further define the user intent. For example, for a user request “invite my friends to my birthday party,” the natural language processor 332 is able to access user data 348 to determine who the “friends” are and when and where the “birthday party” would be held, rather than requiring the user to provide such information explicitly in his/her request.

In some implementations, natural language processor 332 includes categorization module 349. In some implementations, the categorization module 349 determines whether each of the one or more terms in a text string (e.g., corresponding to a speech input associated with a digital photograph) is one of an entity, an activity, or a location, as discussed in greater detail below. In some implementations, the categorization module 349 classifies each term of the one or more terms as one of an entity, an activity, or a location.

Once the natural language processor 332 identifies an actionable intent (or domain) based on the user request, the natural language processor 332 generates a structured query to represent the identified actionable intent. In some implementations, the structured query includes parameters for one or more nodes within the domain for the actionable intent, and at least some of the parameters are populated with the specific information and requirements specified in the user request. For example, the user may say “Make me a dinner reservation at a sushi place at 7.” In this case, the natural language processor 332 may be able to correctly identify the actionable intent to be “restaurant reservation” based on the user input. According to the ontology, a structured query for a “restaurant reservation” domain may include parameters such as {Cuisine}, {Time}, {Date}, {Party Size}, and the like. Based on the information contained in the user's utterance, the natural language processor 332 may generate a partial structured query for the restaurant reservation domain, where the partial structured query includes the parameters {Cuisine=“Sushi”} and {Time=“7 pm”}. However, in this example, the user's utterance contains insufficient information to complete the structured query associated with the domain. Therefore, other necessary parameters such as {Party Size} and {Date} are not specified in the structured query based on the information currently available. In some implementations, the natural language processor 332 populates some parameters of the structured query with received context information. For example, if the user requested a sushi restaurant “near me,” the natural language processor 332 may populate a {location} parameter in the structured query with GPS coordinates from the user device 104.

In some implementations, the natural language processor 332 passes the structured query (including any completed parameters) to the task flow processing module 336 (“task flow processor”). The task flow processor 336 is configured to perform one or more of: receiving the structured query from the natural language processor 332, completing the structured query, and performing the actions required to “complete” the user's ultimate request. In some implementations, the various procedures necessary to complete these tasks are provided in task flow models 354. In some implementations, the task flow models 354 include procedures for obtaining additional information from the user, and task flows for performing actions associated with the actionable intent.

As described above, in order to complete a structured query, the task flow processor 336 may need to initiate additional dialogue with the user in order to obtain additional information, and/or disambiguate potentially ambiguous utterances. When such interactions are necessary, the task flow processor 336 invokes the dialogue processing module 334 (“dialogue processor”) to engage in a dialogue with the user. In some implementations, the dialogue processing module 334 determines how (and/or when) to ask the user for the additional information, and receives and processes the user responses. In some implementations, the questions are provided to and answers are received from the users through the I/O processing module 328. For example, the dialogue processing module 334 presents dialogue output to the user via audio and/or visual output, and receives input from the user via spoken or physical (e.g., touch gesture) responses. Continuing with the example above, when the task flow processor 336 invokes the dialogue processor 334 to determine the “party size” and “date” information for the structured query associated with the domain “restaurant reservation,” the dialogue processor 334 generates questions such as “For how many people?” and “On which day?” to pass to the user. Once answers are received from the user, the dialogue processing module 334 populates the structured query with the missing information, or passes the information to the task flow processor 336 to complete the missing information from the structured query.

In some cases, the task flow processor 336 may receive a structured query that has one or more ambiguous properties. For example, a structured query for the “send a message” domain may indicate that the intended recipient is “Bob,” and the user may have multiple contacts named “Bob.” The task flow processor 336 will request that the dialogue processor 334 disambiguate this property of the structured query. In turn, the dialogue processor 334 may ask the user “Which Bob?”, and display (or read) a list of contacts named “Bob” from which the user may choose.

In some implementations, dialogue processor 334 includes disambiguation module 350. In some implementations, disambiguation module 350 disambiguates one or more ambiguous terms (e.g., one or more ambiguous terms in a text string corresponding to a speech input associated with a digital photograph). In some implementations, disambiguation module 350 identifies that a first term of the one or more terms has multiple candidate meanings, prompts a user for additional information about the first term, receives the additional information from the user in response to the prompt and identifies the entity, activity, or location associated with the first term in accordance with the additional information.

In some implementations, disambiguation module 350 disambiguates pronouns. In such implementations, disambiguation module 350 identifies one of the one or more terms as a pronoun and determines a noun to which the pronoun refers. In some implementations, disambiguation module 350 determines a noun to which the pronoun refers by using a contact list associated with a user of the electronic device. Alternatively, or in addition, disambiguation module 350 determines a noun to which the pronoun refers as a name of an entity, an activity, or a location identified in a previous speech input associated with a previously tagged digital photograph. Alternatively, or in addition, disambiguation module 350 determines a noun to which the pronoun refers as a name of a person identified based on a previous speech input associated with a previously tagged digital photograph.

In some implementations, disambiguation module 330 accesses information obtained from one or more sensors (e.g., proximity sensor 214, light sensor 212, GPS receiver 213, temperature sensor 215, and motion sensor 210) of a handheld electronic device (e.g., user device 104) for determining a meaning of one or more of the terms. In some implementations, disambiguation module 350 identities two terms each associated with one of an entity, an activity, or a location. For example, a first of the two terms refers to a person, and a second of the two terms refers to a location. In some implementations, disambiguation module 350 identifies three terms each associated with one of an entity, an activity, or a location.

Once the task flow processor 336 has completed the structured query for an actionable intent, the task flow processor 336 proceeds to perform the ultimate task associated with the actionable intent. Accordingly, the task flow processor 336 executes the steps and instructions in the task flow model according to the specific parameters contained in the structured query. For example, the task flow model for the actionable intent of “restaurant reservation” may include steps and instructions for contacting a restaurant and actually requesting a reservation for a particular party size at a particular time. For example, using a structured query such as: {restaurant reservation, restaurant=ABC Café, date=3/12/2012, time=7 pm, party size=5}, the task flow processor 336 may perform the steps of: (1) logging onto a server of the ABC Café or a restaurant reservation system that is configured to accept reservations for multiple restaurants, such as the ABC Café, (2) entering the date, time, and party size information in a form on the website, (3) submitting the form, and (4) making a calendar entry for the reservation in the user's calendar. In another example, described in greater detail below, the task flow processor 336 executes steps and instructions associated with tagging or searching for digital photographs in response to a voice input, e.g., in conjunction with photo module 132.

In some implementations, the task flow processor 336 employs the assistance of a service processing module 338 (“service processor”) to complete a task requested in the user input or to provide an informational answer requested in the user input. For example, the service processor 338 can act on behalf of the task flow processor 336 to make a phone call, set a calendar entry, invoke a map search, invoke or interact with other user applications installed on the user device, and invoke or interact with third party services (e.g. a restaurant reservation portal, a social networking website or service, a banking portal, etc.). In some implementations, the protocols and application programming interfaces (API) required by each service can be specified by a respective service model among the service models 356. The service processor 338 accesses the appropriate service model for a service and generates requests for the service in accordance with the protocols and APIs required by the service according to the service model.

For example, if a restaurant has enabled an online reservation service, the restaurant can submit a service model specifying the necessary parameters for making a reservation and the APIs for communicating the values of the necessary parameters to the online reservation service. When requested by the task flow processor 336, the service processor 338 can establish a network connection with the online reservation service using the web address stored in the service models 356, and send the necessary parameters of the reservation (e.g., time, date, party size) to the online reservation interface in a format according to the API of the online reservation service.

In some implementations, the natural language processor 332, dialogue processor 334, and task flow processor 336 are used collectively and iteratively to deduce and define the user's intent, obtain information to further clarify and refine the user intent, and finally generate a response (e.g., provide an output to the user, or complete a task) to fulfill the user's intent.

In some implementations, after all of the tasks needed to fulfill the user's request have been performed, the digital assistant 326 formulates a confirmation response, and sends the response back to the user through the I/O processing module 328. If the user request seeks an informational answer, the confirmation response presents the requested information to the user. In some implementations, the digital assistant also requests the user to indicate whether the user is satisfied with the response produced by the digital assistant 326.

In some implementations, the digital assistant 326 includes a photo module 132 (FIG. 3A). In some implementations, the photo module 132 acts in conjunction with the task flow processing module 336 (FIG. 3A) to search for digital photographs in response to a user input.

The photo module 132 performs operations on and searches for photographs. For example, in some implementations, the photo module 132 creates tags, retrieves tags associated with fingerprints of a digital photograph, associates tags with photographs (e.g., tagging the photograph), searches a photo database (e.g., the photo and tag database 130, FIG. 1) based on a user input to identify photographs, and locally stores photographs each in association with one or more tags.

In some implementations, the photo module 132 includes a search module 360. In some implementations, the search module 360 generates search queries used for searching digital photographs based on speech input, as explained in further detail with reference to Method 400 (FIGS. 4A-4C) below. For example, in some implementations, the photo module 132 receives a natural language text string corresponding to a photo search request, and consults an information source, such as a calendar, social network, etc. (e.g., information service 122-3, calendar service 122-4), to identify information with which to perform a search of photo metadata. As described below, the information may include date parameters, time parameters, or geo-code parameters. The search module 360 identifies, from a collection of photographs (e.g., from the photo and tag database 130, FIG. 1), one or more photographs associated with a tag that matches one of the parameters. For example, for a received voice input corresponding to the search string “find photos of my last vacation,” the search module 360 consults a calendar to determine a date range of the user's last vacation, and searches among the user's photographs for any that were taken within that date range.

In some implementations, the photo module 132 includes local tag/photo storage 326. In some implementations, after the camera subsystem takes a photograph or a video, the local tag/photo storage 326 stores the photographs and tags (including, for example, metadata tags including date, time, and geo-code tags) in association with the digital photograph or video. In some implementations, the local tag/photo storage 326 stores the tags jointly with the corresponding digital photograph(s). Alternatively, or in addition, the local tag/photo storage 326 stores the tags in a remote location (e.g., on a separate memory storage device) from the corresponding photograph(s), but stores links or indexes to the corresponding photographs in association with the stored tags.

FIGS. 4A-4C are flow diagrams representing methods for searching for photographs using a voice-based digital assistant, according to certain implementations. While the present discussion refers primarily to searching for photographs, the same discussion applies equally to other media items, such as video, audio, etc. Moreover, while the following discussion describes steps, procedures, and operations as being performed by the digital assistant system 300, the steps, procedures, and operations are, in some implementations, performed by the user device 104 a, the server system 108, or any other suitable device or combination of devices described above.

Photographs are typically associated with metadata tags when they are captured and/or stored by a camera, scanner, etc. For example, digital photographs often include metadata tags, including a date stamp and/or a time stamp that identifies when a photograph was taken, and a geo-code that identifies where the photograph was taken. Metadata tags are written into or otherwise associated with the digital file, e.g., the data is stored in or appears as the file's “properties.” Metadata formats such as Exchangeable Image File Format (EXIF) and/or Extensible Metadata Platform (XMP) may be used. Taken alone, this information is of limited use. Specifically, a photograph taken during a user's birthday will be tagged with a date stamp of that day (e.g., 8/16/2010), but in order to search for this photograph the user must actually enter the actual date. Of course, the user could take the time to review his photographs and assign keyword tags to the photographs to make searching easier (e.g., tagging the photo with the word “birthday”), but this is cumbersome and time consuming, and many users do not take the time to prospectively assign tags for later searching and/or categorization.

However, there are many information sources that are available to a digital assistant system that can be used to correlate calendar dates (as well as times and geo-codes) with names of events, places, people, etc. For example, a calendar associated with the user (e.g., the calendar service 122-4, or a calendar application stored on and/or provided by a user device) may contain information that links a semantic meaning—such as “birthday”—to a date—such as August 16th. By using such information sources, the digital assistant system is able to resolve natural language search queries (e.g., “show me pictures from my birthday”), into a query based on date, time, or geo-code, so that photographs can be searched based on the metadata tags that are already associated with the photographs.

Many types of information sources can be used to resolve natural language search queries into dates, times, and/or geo-codes that can be used to search for photographs. An electronic calendar, for example, may contain significant amounts of information relating to events, people, times, or locations that can be used to identify specific dates and/or times to be used for photo searching. For example, a calendar may include an entry indicating that a friend's birthday party is on a certain day and at a certain time (e.g., “Tina's Birthday Party”). If a user requests “Pictures from Tina's Party,” the digital assistant will determine the date on which “Tina's Party” occurred, and search for photographs having corresponding date tags and time tags. (As discussed below, the digital assistant may expand the search range by an appropriate margin so that all relevant photographs are identified even if they fall outside the explicit time, date, or location range indicated by the information source.) As another example, a calendar may associate the names of holidays (e.g., national holidays, religious holidays, work holidays, etc.) with specific dates. Thus, a user can search for “Pics from the Labor Day Picnic,” and the digital assistant, after accessing the calendar, will search for photos taken on Labor Day (e.g., 10/5/2011). In some implementations, if the calendar simply indicates the date of the Labor Day holiday, then the digital assistant searches for any photograph taken on that day (or over that weekend). In some implementations, the digital assistant uses other words in the user's natural language query to refine or modify the dates, times, or locations of the photo search. In this case, the term “picnic” may be associated with events that occur primarily after 12:00 AM, and/or that occur at a park or recreational area. Accordingly, the digital assistant may search for photographs taken in the afternoon or at likely picnic locations on Labor Day. In some implementations, if the user has a calendar entry for “Labor Day Picnic” that spans a certain time range, the search will focus on photographs taken within that specific time range (plus an appropriate margin, if necessary or desired).

In some implementations, calendars or other data services (e.g., information services 122-3) convert relative or ambiguous date/time references in a user's query to actual dates and/or times. For example, in some implementations, a calendar or service converts terms such as “yesterday,” “last week,” “this morning,” “the other day,” “the other week,” and “the past week” (e.g., relative and/or ambiguous time/date references), to absolute date and/or time values or ranges. Where the query term is relative but not ambiguous, it will be converted into the absolute date/time to which it corresponds (e.g., “yesterday” and “last week” refer to specific absolute date/time ranges, but are couched in relative terms). Where the query term is ambiguous (e.g., “the other day,” or “earlier today”), the calendar or service will convert the reference to a date/time range that is appropriate given the query term. For example, the term “the other day” may be converted to a date range of the previous 1, 3, 5, or 10 days (or any other number of days). The term “the other week” may be converted to a date range of the previous 1, 3, 5, or 10 weeks (or any other number of weeks). The term “this morning” may be converted to a time range of 12:00 AM to 12:00 PM on that same day.

Also, calendar entries often contain location information that can be used by the digital assistant to facilitate photo searching. For example, a calendar entry that states “Vacation in Maui” or “Picnic at Foothills Park” provides information linking location information to dates and event information (e.g., “vacation” and “picnic”). Thus, the digital assistant can determine what dates are associated with a query that specifies only a location, such as “pics from Maui,” or what geo-codes are associated with a query that specifies only an event, such as “display vacation photos.” These dates or geo-codes can then be used as search parameters to identify photographs with corresponding date tags or geo-code tags.

While the above examples describe using calendars to identify dates, times, and/or geo-codes for photo searching, other information sources may have the same or similar information. For example, such information may be available from a user's social networks accounts, contact lists, digital wallet, travel itineraries, receipts, and the like. In the case of social networks, a user may post information to the social network, such as “just returned from a vacation in Maui!” Accordingly, if a user requests “vacation photos”—a query that lacks time or location information—the social network post can be used to determine what geo-codes are likely to be associated with her “vacation photos” (e.g., geo-codes associated with Maui). Also, contact lists may include information such as birthdays, anniversaries, and/or addresses. Accordingly, if a user says to a digital assistant “bring up pictures from Jim's birthday,” Jim's birthdate can be identified from the contact list in order to search for photos with a corresponding date tag. In another example, if a user requests “Photos from last week's trip,” the digital assistant may use travel itineraries or receipts (e.g., for planes, trains, rental cars, etc.) to determine dates, times, and/or locations of that vacation. Information sources may be available from any number of sources and/or locations. For example, in some implementations, calendars, contact lists, digital wallets, travel itineraries, and the like may be stored on a portable electronic device, such as a smartphone (e.g., user device 104 a, FIG. 1). In some implementations, this information is additionally or alternatively stored by one or more remote computers or services, suck as the digital assistant server 106, information service 122-3, calendar service 122-4, social networking service 122-7, etc. (FIG. 1).

Where photographs are to be searched using location, information, it may be necessary to translate names of locations into geo-codes. Specifically, if photographs include automatically generated location information, it is often in the form of a geo-code, such as a latitude-longitude coordinate pair. But when location information for photo searching is identified using an information source such as a calendar, flight itinerary, social network post, etc., it is often in the form of a location name or an address. This information thus requires some translation before it may be used to search for photographs that are tagged with geographical coordinate pairs. Accordingly, in some implementations, geo-code lookup tables or databases are used to convert location information into geo-codes for searching. In some implementations, when a location is identified (e.g., “Maui, Hawaii”), a range of geo-codes corresponding to Maui, Hawaii are identified, and the digital assistant searches for photographs that fall within the geographical area specified by those geo-codes. In some implementations, locations identified in a user's natural language search query are converted to a range of possible geo-codes, and the digital assistant identifies photos whose geo-code tags match the range of possible geo-codes. In some implementations, the digital assistant determines locations associated with the geo-code tags of the photographs to be searched (e.g., instead of or in addition to determining geo-codes of the location identified in the search query), and determines whether any of those geo-code tags correspond to the location identified in the search query. In some implementations, both of these techniques are used.

In some implementations, the digital assistant uses metadata tags of one photograph that is associated with user-generated information in order to identify time, date, or geo-code parameters to use to search for other photographs. For example, if a user posts a picture to a website of a social network, and the user (or another person in the social network) comments on, captions, or otherwise tags that photograph, it is plausible that the caption or comment describes some aspect of the photograph. Thus, the comment “From our vacation!” suggests that the photograph with which it is associated was taken during the user's vacation. Accordingly, it follows that the time, date, and/or geo-code tag of that photograph corresponds with a time, date, and/or location of the user's vacation. These tags are then used as search parameters to locate other photographs with the same or similar metadata tags. Thus, even where a comment, caption, or tag for one photograph does not itself include time, date, or location information, such information can still be determined from the time, date, or geo-code tags of that one photograph.

In general, it is preferred that a photo search return all available relevant photographs and no irrelevant photographs. However, search algorithms are often either under-inclusive (i.e., they miss some relevant results) or are over-inclusive (i.e., they include some irrelevant results along with the relevant ones). Thus, in some implementations, the digital assistant uses combinations of information sources and search parameters to identify a useful set of candidate photographs without including too many irrelevant photos or too few relevant ones. For example, a user may travel to many different locations during a vacation, such that searching for photos that took place in a specific country or city will return too few results. Accordingly, the digital assistant may perform searches based on any combination of time, date, and geo-code information in order to provide a useful and comprehensive search result.

As one example, a person may vacation in Maui for a few days, take a day trip to one of the other Hawaiian Islands, and then return to Maui for the remainder of the vacation. In some implementations, in order to respond to a search query for “pictures from my Maui trip,” the digital assistant will determine that the user recently flew to Maui (e.g., using a recent travel itinerary), and identify a geo-code parameter for Maui for the photo search. In some implementations, the digital assistant will also determine that the user blocked off 7 days in her calendar as “vacation.” Thus, the digital assistant can also search for photographs that took place in a different location, but are within the dates specified by the user's calendar. In some implementations, the digital assistant searches for photographs taken at a particular location, but excludes photographs that fall outside a time or date range. For example, if a user has taken several trips to a certain location, only those photographs that were taken during the previously identified “vacation” time range will be returned. Even where no specific date or time range has been identified, photographs can be inferred to relate to a particular event or type of event based on their dates and times by identifying a grouping of photographs and/or ignoring photographs with outlying dates. For example, if a user has 100 photos all taken in Hawaii during a 1 week span, and 2 additional photos from Maui taken 5 weeks away from the first grouping, it can be inferred that the 2 additional photos are not associated with the user's vacation.

In some implementations, the digital assistant searches for photographs taken during a date range (e.g., corresponding to a vacation entry in a calendar), but excludes photographs that are taken at a location that is not associated with the user. For example, a user may save photographs that were taken by someone else and that have nothing to do with their vacation, but happen to have been taken on the same day, or in the same location. In some cases, these photographs should not be identified as the user's “vacation photos.” In some implementations, if the user requests “my vacation, photos” or “photos from my vacation,” for example, the digital assistant will recognize the term “my” and determine that the user only wishes to see their own photographs. The digital assistant then limits the results to only the user's photos (e.g., by excluding photos taken at a location not associated with the user). In some implementations, the digital assistant does not attempt to limit photographs to those that are taken by or otherwise associated with a user. For example, a user may request “photos from Paris” as a general image search. In such a case, the digital assistant may perform a general search to retrieve photos that are taken in Paris, even if they were not taken by the user.

In some implementations, searches that combine date/time and location information, as described above, get the information from any combination of sources. For example, a query may include multiple types of information, such as when a user says “get my Hawaii pics from last week.” this query provides both location and temporal information. In some implementations, a query will include only one type of information, but another type of information is inferred from the query. For example, a query that says “get my Hawaii photos” can be cross-referenced with a travel itinerary showing when the user was scheduled to travel to Hawaii. The multiple types of information can then be used to provide an ideal set of search results, as the above examples describe.

In some implementations, the digital assistant engages in a dialogue with a user in order to refine and/or disambiguate a search query, to acquire additional information that may help limit search results to a more relevant set, or to increase a confidence that the digital assistant has correctly understood the query. For example, if a user searches for “photos from last summer's vacation,” the digital assistant may respond to the user (e.g., via audible and/or visual output) by asking “did you mean all photos, or photos taken in a particular area?” The user can then respond with the additional information (e.g., by speaking “just Hawaii,” or “all of them”). In this example, the digital assistant may have initially identified multiple groups of photos that relate to a search query for “vacation” and “summer,” but were taken at different locations. Thus, the digital assistant requests the additional information from the user in order to determine which photographs the user wishes to see. The digital assistant may also or additionally identify that a search query does not contain sufficient information with which to generate a relevant result set. For example, the digital assistant may recognize that the search query for “photos from last summer's vacation” is likely to return too many results, or that those photos that are returned do not match a model or profile of “vacation” pictures (e.g., they were taken in too many different locations, they span too long a time, there are significant gaps between returned photos, etc.). Accordingly, in some implementations, the digital assistant will request additional information from the user in order to generate a search query that will return a more appropriate result set.

The photographs that are searched in response to a search query are any photographs that are associated with the user (or are publicly accessible) and accessible by the digital assistant. In some implementations, the photographs are stored on the device with which a user accesses or interfaces with a digital assistant. For example, when the user accesses a digital assistant with a smart phone, tablet computer, or camera (among other possibilities), the digital assistant may search photographs stored on that device. (Although processing the natural language input, consulting with information sources, etc., may be performed by that device or other devices, such as the digital assistant server 108, one or more external services 122-n, etc., either individually or in combination.) In some implementations, the photographs are stored remotely from the device with which the user accesses or interfaces with the digital assistant. For example, in some implementations, photographs are stored in the “cloud,” i.e., at a remote server connected to the Internet. The remote server may be operated by a storage provider, a social network, a network accessible home media server or storage unit, a photo-hosting website, etc. In some implementations, the digital assistant is authorized to access (e.g., search for, view, edit, download, etc.) remotely stored images using an authorization technique. For example, in some implementations, the digital assistant is associated with credentials that allow the digital assistant to programmatically access the image sources. Specifically, the digital assistant is provided with a user's credentials to a social networking site so that the assistant can use the social network as an information source (e.g., to determine dates, times, or locations indicated by a natural language search query), or as a photograph source (e.g., to search for images that may be relevant to the natural language search query).

According to some implementations, the following methods allow a user to search for photographs on an electronic device, such as a smart phone, portable music player, laptop computer, tablet computer, etc. When a user wishes to retrieve photographs for viewing, the user may simply provide a natural language input, and the digital assistant system 300 processes the natural language input to determine what parameters to use in order to search for relevant photographs. To do so, as described above, the digital assistant system 300 uses one or more information sources to determine specific date, time, and/or geo-code search parameters that correspond to the natural language input. Then, photographs are searched to identify those that have metadata tags matching the date, time, and/or geo-code parameters of the search. Accordingly, the photographs need not be first tagged with or otherwise associated with natural language keywords in order for the natural language search feature to work.

Returning to FIGS. 4A-4C, method 400 represents a method for searching for media items using a voice-based digital assistant. Method 400 is, optionally, governed by instructions that are stored in a non-transitory computer readable storage medium and that are executed by one or more processors of one or more computer systems of a digital assistant system, including, but not limited to, the server system 108, the user device 104 a, and/or the photo service 122-6. Each of the operations shown in FIGS. 4A-4C typically corresponds to instructions stored in a computer memory or non-transitory computer readable storage medium (e.g., memory 250 of client device 104, memory 302 associated with the digital assistant system 300). The computer readable storage medium may include a magnetic or optical disk storage device, solid state storage devices such as Flash memory, or other non-volatile memory device or devices. The computer readable instructions stored on the computer readable storage medium may include one or more of: source code, assembly language code, object code, or other instruction format that is interpreted by one or more processors. In various implementations, some operations in method 400 may be combined and/or the order of some operations may be changed from the order shown in FIGS. 4A-4C. Moreover, in some implementations, one or more operations in method 400 is performed by modules of the digital assistant system 300, including, for example, the natural language processing module 332, the dialogue flow processing module 334, the photo module 132, and/or any sub modules thereof.

Multiple media items are provided, wherein at least some of the media items are each associated with a respective tag comprising at least one of a time tag, a date tag, or a geo-code tag (402). In some implementations, a geo-code tag includes GPS coordinates. In some implementations, GPS coordinates comprise a latitude/longitude pair. In some implementations, the tags are metadata that is stored with the media items.

Respective ones of the multiple media items may be stored in various locations. For example, in some implementations, at least a subset of the multiple media items is stored on the electronic device. In some implementations, at least a subset of the multiple media items is stored remotely from the electronic device. In some implementations, the remotely stored media items are associated with a social networking account of a user of the electronic device. For example, a user may allow a voice-based digital assistant to access the user's social networking account so that the digital assistant can search for and retrieve media items (and/or other information) associated with the user's account. In some implementations, the digital assistant has permission to access the social networking account by virtue of a device-wide authorization.

In some implementations, the multiple media items are photographs (404). In some implementations the multiple media items are videos (406).

A natural language text string is provided, the text string corresponding to a search query for one or more media items, wherein the search query includes one or more query terms (412). In some implementations, the one or more query terms do not include any of a date, a time, or a geo-code.

In some implementations, prior to step (412), a speech input is received from a user, wherein the natural language text string corresponds to the speech input (408), and speech-to-text processing is performed on the speech input to generate the natural language text string (410). For example, a user may provide a speech input representing a query to the digital assistant, such as “show me my vacation pics.” The speech input (e.g., recorded and/or cached audio) is converted to text using speech-to-text processing. The resulting text string is provided to the digital assistant. In some implementations, the speech-to-text processing (410) is performed by the same device on which the speech input was recorded. In some implementations, the speech-to-text processing (410) is performed by a different device, such as a remote speech-to-text processing server.

Method 400 continues on FIG. 4B. At least one information source is searched to identify at least one parameter associated with at least one of the one or more query terms (414). The at least one parameter comprises at least one of a time parameter, a date parameter, or a geo-code parameter, and the at least one parameter is separate from the tags associated with the multiple media items. In some implementations, the at least one information source is selected from the group consisting of: a calendar; email messages; text messages; social network postings; a contact book; travel itineraries; and an event schedule. (416). In some implementations, a calendar is a publicly accessible calendar that correlates public holidays, religious holidays, public events, and the like. In some implementations, a calendar is a private calendar associated with a user of the digital assistant. A user's private calendar may be stored, for example, on a user device (e.g., user device 104 a, FIG. 1), or on an external service (e.g., calendar service 122-4 or digital assistant server 106, FIG. 1). In some implementations, a user's calendar is stored on a combination of these or other devices.

In some implementations, text messages (e.g., step 416) include messages that include a textual component, such as SMS (simple message service) messages, instant messages, and the like. In some implementations, the contents of the text messages may be accessed in order to identify possible context clues that may identify media items. Specifically, a text message sent or received by a user very near in time to a time stamp of a photograph may contain information that identifies the contents of the picture. Or, the textual content of a text message that included a media item (e.g., a photograph) as an attachment may provide clues about the contents of the media item. For example, a text message sent 2 minutes after the user took a photograph of the beach may say “We're at Polo Beach—meet us when you can.” This text can be used to identity that the photograph is likely to have been taken at a Beach, and to facilitate search and retrieval of that photograph using a natural language input.

As noted above, at least one parameter associated with at least one of the one or more query terms is identified (414). In some implementations, a time parameter comprises a time range surrounding a time specified in the one or more query terms (418). For example, if a query includes the terms “yesterday around 2,” the time parameter may comprise a time range of 12:00 to 4:00 PM of the previous day.

In some implementations, a date parameter comprises a date range surrounding a date specified in the one or more query terms (420). For example, if a query term is “Christmas,” the date parameter may compose a date range from December 23 to December 27.

In some implementations, a calendar associated with a user is searched to identify an event spanning a range of dates including and/or near the holiday. For example, a calendar may have a vacation event spanning a holiday, such as the Fourth of July. Thus, the date range of the vacation event can serve as a date parameter corresponding to a search for media items from the Fourth of July. After searching the calendar, the date tags associated with the multiple media items are searched (e.g., step (414) above) to identify at least one media item whose associated date tag falls within the range of dates.

In other examples, if a query includes a term indicating a range of a single day, the time parameter may comprise a range including 1, 2, or 3 (or more) days on either side of the indicated day. If a query includes a term indicating a range of one or more weeks, the time parameter may comprise a range including an additional 1, 2, or 3 days on either side of the specified week, or 1, 2, or 3 or more additional weeks on either side of the specified week(s). If a query includes a term indicating a range of one or more hours, the time parameter may comprise a range including ½, 1, 2, or 3 (or more) hours on either side. If a query includes a term indicating a range of one or several minutes (i.e., less than 1 hour), the time parameter may comprise a range including 5, 10, 15, or 30 (or more) minutes on either side. If a query includes a term indicating a range of one or several years, the time parameter may comprise a range including 2, 3, or 6 (or more) months on either side. Non-numerical query terms may also cause the digital assistant to expand a time parameter to include a greater range. For example, in some implementations, when a query includes a holiday (e.g., Labor Day), the time parameter may comprise the entire week or weekend on which that holiday falls. The digital assistant may also expand or adjust other parameters, such as a geo-code parameters based on the user's query. For example, if a user specifies a city in a search query, the geo-code parameter may be expanded to include surrounding cities, a county/state/region surrounding the city, etc. If a user specifies a country, the geo-code parameter may be expanded to include surrounding countries.

In some implementations, a geo-code parameter comprises a range of geo-codes associated with a location specified in the one or more query terms (422). In some implementations, the range of geo-codes corresponds to geographical boundaries of the location (424). For example, the range of geo-codes may correspond to the geographical boundaries of a city, a state, a park, a town, an island, etc. In some implementations, the range of geo-codes corresponds to a principal geo-code and one or more distances from the principal geo-code in one or more directions (426). For example, the principal geo-code may correspond to a representative geographical location for a particular location (e.g., the center of a city, the entrance of a park, etc.), and the one or more distances from the principal geo-code may correspond to a radius around the principal geo-code (e.g., a 1, 5, 20, or 100 mile radius, or other distances).

In some implementations, the one or more query terms (e.g., from the search query, (412)) include an event name, and the at least one information source includes information that associates event names with dates (428). For example, in some implementations, a calendar associates event names with dates. In some implementations, the event name is a religious holiday, an national holiday, a birthday, a season, a sporting event, or the like (430).

Method 400 continues on FIG. 4C. The respective tags are compared to the at least one parameter (432). Specifically, in some implementations, the geo-code tags, time tags, and/or date tags are compared with the time geo-code parameter, time parameter, and/or the date parameter, respectively, that were identified by searching the at least one information source. For example, a natural language text string may have included the query “get my vacation photos,” which resulted in identifying, from the user's calendar (or through a disambiguation dialogue with the user, described above), that the user recently vacationed in Hawaii. The geo-code tags of photographs and videos associated with the user may then be compared with a range of geo-code parameters associated with the state of Hawaii to determine which photographs are likely to fall in the category of user's “vacation photos.” In some implementations, locations of photographs are determined using image recognition techniques. For example, the location of an image that lacks a geo-code tag may be identified by comparing that photo to other photos with known locations. The determined location can then be used in place of a geo-code tag to facilitate searching of that photograph. Image recognition techniques (e.g., using image fingerprints to automatically tag images with location information, for example) are described in “Voice-Based Image Tagging and Searching,” Attorney docket number 063266-5572-US, which is incorporated by reference in its entirety.

Presentation of the at least one media item to the user is facilitated (434). In some implementations, such as where the method 400 is performed at a handheld electronic device or a client computer system, facilitating presentation of the at least one media item includes displaying the at least one media item on a display device (436). In some implementations, such as where the method 400 is performed at a server system, facilitating presentation of the at least one media item comprises sending the at least one media item and/or an address or identifier of the at least one media item, to a client device for display (438).

In some implementations, a confidence value is assigned to each identified media item, wherein the confidence value corresponds to the strength of the match between the time tag, the date tag, or the geo-code tag of the media item and the time, the date, or the geo-code associated with the at least one of the one or more query terms (440). In some implementations, the strength of a match is determined by the nearness of the tag of the media item to the search parameter. For example, if a user searches for “photos from Christmas,” a media item with a date tag of “12/25/11” may have a higher confidence value than one taken on December 20 of that year. Where a plurality of media items are to be presented, the plurality of media items are ranked based on the confidence values, and the plurality of media items are displayed in an order based on the ranking (422). Thus, the media items that are more likely to match, or more closely match, the user's query are displayed to the user first.

It should be understood that the particular order in which the operations in FIGS. 4A-4C have been described are merely exemplary and are not intended to indicate that the described order is the only order in which the operations could be performed.

The foregoing description, for purpose of explanation, has been described with reference to specific implementations. However, the illustrative discussions above are not intended to be exhaustive or to limit the disclosed implementations to the precise forms disclosed. Many modifications and variations are possible in view of the above teachings. The implementations were chosen and described in order to best explain the principles and practical applications of the disclosed ideas, to thereby enable others skilled in the art to best utilize them with various modifications as are suited to the particular use contemplated.

It will be understood that, although the terms “first,” “second,” etc. may be used herein describe various elements, these elements should not be limited by these terms. These terms are only used to distinguish one element from another. For example, a first photograph could be termed a second photograph, and, similarly, a second photograph could be termed a first photograph, without changing the meaning of the description, so long as all occurrences of the “first photograph” are renamed consistently and all occurrences of the second photograph are renamed consistently. The first photograph and the second photograph are both phonographs, but they are not the same photograph.

The terminology used herein is for the purpose of describing particular implementations only and is not intended to be limiting of the claims. As used in the description of the implementations and the appended claims, the singular forms “a”, “an” and “the” are intended to include the plural forms as well, unless the context clearly indicates otherwise. It will also be understood that the term “and/or” as used herein refers so and encompasses any and all possible combinations of one or more of the associated listed items. It will be further understood that the terms “comprises” and/or “comprising,” when used in this specification, specify the presence of stated features, integers, steps, operations, elements, and/or components, but do not preclude the presence or addition of one or more other features, integers, steps, operations, elements, components, and/or groups thereof.

As used herein, the term “if” may be construed to mean “when” or “upon” or “in response to determining” or “in accordance with a determination” or “in response to detecting,” that a stated condition precedent is true, depending on the context. Similarly, the phrase “if it is determined [that a stated condition precedent is true]” or “if [a stated condition precedent is true]” or “when [a stated condition precedent is true]” may be construed to mean “upon, determining” or “in response to determining” or “in accordance with a determination” or “upon detecting” or “in response to detecting” that the stated condition precedent is true, depending on the context. 

1-30. (canceled)
 31. An electronic device, comprising: a memory; one or more programs, wherein the one or more programs are stored in the memory and configured to be executed by the one or more processors, the one or more programs including instructions for: providing a plurality of media items wherein at least some of the media items are each associated with one or more respective tags; providing a natural language text string corresponding to a search query for one or more media items, wherein the search query includes one or more query terms; identifying, based on the search query, a first media item of the plurality of media items, wherein the first media item is associated with user-generated information and wherein the user-generated information matches a query term of the one or more query terms; comparing the respective tags of the identified first media item to the respective tags of one or more other media items of the plurality of media items to identify a second media item; and facilitating the presentation of the first media item and the second media item to a user.
 32. The electronic device of claim 31, wherein the one or more respective tags comprise at least one of a time tag, a date tag, or a geo-code tag.
 33. The electronic device of claim 31, wherein the one or more programs further include instructions for: accessing the user-generated information from an information source.
 34. The electronic device of claim 33, wherein the information source is selected from the group consisting of: a calendar; email messages; text messages; social network postings; a contact book; travel itineraries; and an event schedule.
 35. The electronic device of claim 33, wherein the one or more programs further include instructions for: accessing the user-generated information from the information source in response to receiving the search query.
 36. The electronic device of claim 33, wherein the one or more query terms include an event name, and wherein the information source associates event names with dates.
 37. The electronic device of claim 31, wherein the user-generated information is part of a caption or a comment of a social network posting.
 38. The electronic device of claim 31, wherein the one or more query terms do not include any of a date, a time, or a geo-code.
 39. The electronic device of claim 31, wherein the second media item is not associated with the user-generated information.
 40. The electronic device of claim 31, wherein at least one of the plurality of media items is a photograph.
 41. The electronic device of claim 31, wherein at least one of the plurality of media items is a video.
 42. The electronic device of claim 31, wherein at least one of the plurality of media items is an audio.
 43. The electronic device of claim 31, wherein the tags are metadata stored with the plurality of media items.
 44. The electronic device of claim 31, wherein at least a subset of the plurality of media items is stored on the electronic device.
 45. The electronic device of claim 31, wherein at least a subset of the multiple media items is stored remotely from the electronic device.
 46. The electronic device of claim 45, wherein the remotely stored media items are associated with a social networking account of a user of the electronic device.
 47. The electronic device of claim 31, wherein the one or more programs further include instructions for: receiving a speech input from a user, wherein the natural language text string corresponds to the speech input.
 48. The electronic device of claim 47, wherein the one or more programs further include instructions for: performing speech-to-text processing on the speech input to generate the natural language text string.
 49. The electronic device of claim 31, wherein the one or more programs further include instructions for: displaying, on a display of the electronic device, the first media item and the second media item.
 50. The electronic device of claim 49, wherein the one or more programs further include instructions for: assigning a confidence value to each of the first media item and the second media item; prior to the displaying, ranking the first media item and the second media item based on the respective confidence values, wherein the first media item and the second media item are displayed in an order based on the ranking.
 51. The electronic device of claim 31, wherein the electronic device is a handheld electronic device.
 52. A method for searching for media items using a voice-based digital assistant, comprising: at an electronic device with a processor and memory storing instructions for execution by the processor: providing a plurality of media items wherein at least some of the media items are each associated with a respective tag comprising at least one of a time tag, a date tag, or a geo-code tag; providing a natural language text string corresponding to a search query for one or more media items, wherein the search query includes one or more query terms; identifying, based on the search query, a first media item of the plurality of media items, wherein the media item is associated with user-generated information and wherein the user-generated information matches a query term of the one or more query terms; comparing the respective tags of the identified first media item to the respective tags of one or more other media items of the plurality of media items to identify a second media item; and facilitating the presentation of the first media item and the second media item to a user.
 53. A non-transitory computer readable storage medium storing one or more programs, the one or more programs comprising instructions, which when executed by one or more processors of an electronic device, cause the device to: provide a plurality of media items wherein at least some of the media items are each associated with a respective tag comprising at least one of a time tag, a date tag, or a geo-code tag; provide a natural language text string corresponding to a search query for one or more media items, wherein the search query includes one or more query terms; identify, based on the search query, a first media item of the plurality of media items, wherein the media item is associated with user-generated information and wherein the user-generated information matches a query term of the one or more query terms; compare the respective tags of the identified first media item to the respective tags of one or more other media items of the plurality of media items to identify a second media item; and facilitate the presentation of the first media item and the second media item to a user. 